


Where deep waters flow

by MiraHerondale



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Bearded John, But they are so in love, First Time, Human!John, M/M, Magic elements, Mermaids, Or they will be - Freeform, Romance, Slow Burn, Tags will be added with time, Virgin Sherlock, because reasons, eventually, it always does, merman!Sherlock, mystrade will pop up at some point, scuva diver john, they are so dumb
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-10
Updated: 2019-08-31
Packaged: 2020-04-24 07:50:49
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,098
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19168951
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MiraHerondale/pseuds/MiraHerondale
Summary: Cave diving had rescued him as if it were a lifeboat. After being shot, invalided, and subsequently becoming depressed, his mind was rotting. Trapped in a small London bedsit, unable to perform surgery anymore and with only a ridiculously small army pension to support himself, John felt adrift. Ella was not helping, and their therapy sessions only felt like a nuisance.Finding Mike Stamford had been sheer luck, he had to admit. He had introduced John to Victor after he said, almost jokingly, that maybe a hobby would help him unwind. Victor was a very nice man. Politely, he had taken John under his wing and introduced him to scuba diving. He had also been seduced by the idea  because, once inside the water, neither his leg nor his shoulder hurt that much. He nearly felt like a proper, functional human being again.And now, he was not only  a very good diver, but also a professional one: a professional cave diver.





	1. The cave

**Author's Note:**

> Late mermay, yall!
> 
> My obsession with mermaid stuff is well known, so it was a matter of time until I got my hands onto some _mermish_ stories. I'll try to keep my updates as regular as possible, and in tandem with the ones of the [angel! fic I'm also working on.](https://archiveofourown.org/works/18215786/chapters/43094165)
> 
> As always, immense thanks Ami, my wonderful, precious beta. You do an amazing job and I hope my many mistakes won't discourage you from being my beta anymore!
> 
> Hope you like it!

The water inside the cave was freezing cold.

Yet alone, in the depths of an unexplored oceanic cave, even in those freezing waters, he felt at home.

John was being lured to explore a new cave with his diving club, but he had enthusiastically refused. During his sailings around the coast he had found a lovely islet not too far from the shores of Dover. He had been surprised to find it relatively intact, as if it had been untouched by the hands of men since… well, forever. He had made a preliminary dive to check if there was something worth investigating, and when he found the entrance of acave a couple of weeks ago he decided he needed to plan a longer visit. 

And boy, he was so glad he did. Because the cave was breathtaking. The water was practically clear blue and the walls, clean of algae and other underwater flora, were almost soft to touch under the fabric of his gloves. There was coral growing at the entrance and small colourful fish darting around the likes of which he had never seen anywhere on the coasts of the UK. Not yet, anyway.

He moored his dive boat near a small beach connected to the islet. The white sand was a beautiful sight and the water was the perfect depth for him to leave the boat safely without fear of damaging his equipment. After he was more than 3 km deep inside the cave, John decided he ought to take Victor and Carol with him next time he visited. He made sure the light was bright enough for the  _ GoPro  _ on his head to film everything with high quality, exchanging the smaller torch for the big one, and smiled. John was always the one in charge of holding the bigger torch and wearing the camera attached to his head. Neither Carol nor Victor wanted to wear it, but they sure enjoyed the footage John posted on his _ YouTube _ channel.

Cave diving had rescued him as if it were a lifeboat. After being shot, invalided, and subsequently becoming depressed, his mind was rotting. Trapped in a small London bedsit, unable to perform surgery anymore and with only a ridiculously small army pension to support himself, John felt adrift. Ella was not helping, and their therapy sessions only felt like a nuisance.

Finding Mike Stamford had been sheer luck, he had to admit. He had introduced John to Victor after he said, almost jokingly, that maybe a hobby would help him unwind. Victor was a very nice man. Politely, he had taken John under his wing and introduced him to scuba diving. He had also been seduced by the idea  because, once inside the water, neither his leg nor his shoulder hurt that much. He nearly felt like a proper, functional human being again. 

And now, he was not only  a very good diver, but also a professional one: a professional cave diver.

Inside the cave, the natural rock formations created thin passages through which oxygen tanks could be safely and carefully manoeuvred. The silence —except for the sound of his breathing, the occasional bubbles, and the information alerts from his watch— was extremely peaceful. It was one of the things John loved the most about diving. It was so... quiet.

He reached an open space which was full of stalagmites, creating shadows and making for a pretty view, as well as a difficult experience. But he’d be damned if he said he didn’t enjoy every second of it. Slowly, and after what seemed like hours, the stalagmites disappeared and he reached a sort of canal. It was a thick underwater tube of solid, smooth rock, slightly curved. The passage was big enough to loosely fit two people side by side. At some point, the passage branched into two paths, each as big as the one he started in, and both were pitch black. John looked down at his wrist watch. It might be time to turn around, just in case he got lost trying to find the entrance again. He always disliked leaving caves with his oxygen reaching risky levels. The thinner parts of the cave would take him a while to navigate again on his way back and he had no way of knowing if the cave had a second exit ahead of him. Maybe he could come back on other days, try to find alternate routes, or train to spend as little time as possible crossing the rock formations.

With a sigh, he began to turn around, but something caught his eye. The cave had been devoid of fish and other creatures for a while, but something had moved near the divided entrance. Something... big. Either that or he had somehow projected his own shadow at a weird angle…

Frowning, he pointed the torch at the passage, seeing nothing but darkness and smooth white walls of rock. Checking his oxygen levels again, he decided he had enough left to swim a couple of meters ahead. A quick peek wouldn’t do any harm. It’s not like he was going to fully inspect the divided tunnel.

As he swung the light  towards the tunnel again, something happened.

An enormous creature burst out of it. At first John thought it might be a shark. Instinctively, he covered his face with his hands, dropping the torch. The light spun as the torch fell, making everything more terrible, creating odd shadows against the walls around him. He could hear something like a whale, muffled by the water and his breathing system. Something big hit him hard in the middle of his chest, crushing him against the cold curved wall of the cave. A sharp pain exploded at the back of his head and left him momentarily blind. The body against his pushed harder and he groaned, feeling the ache in his chest. 

Whatever it was, it had an almost obscene strength and clearly was huge. From the feel of it John thought it might be a giant snake, if that made any sense at all. He could feel a hardworking muscle contracting and relaxing inside the body pressed against his, much like a python asphyxiating its prey. Something pointy was touching his neck and chest, as large and round as one of his fingers. Spines? He could hear clicking noises occasionally accompanied by extremely high or low pitched moans, like the ones dolphins make. . John was as surprised as he was scared. Not a shark by the sound of it... Whatever it was, it had scales. No dolphin either and definitely not a whale or any other mammal he could think of but...

The torch finally settled at the bottom of the cave, and he dared to take a look at the creature. Worried as he was with trying not to die, he hadn’t noticed the cave had gone dead silent and absolutely still.

In the cold light, the shadows were hard and created strange contrasts and for a second John wished he could believe this was just a trick of the light. Because he was seeing a man. Or at least, what very much looked like a man, looking back at him with a furious gaze. No respiratory system, no breathing aid, no neoprene. Apparently just a naked man with milky, white skin.

His eyes were big and bright grey with long black eyelashes. His face was angular, the cheekbones prominent. A cloud of short, dark hair floated behind him and John swore he could see something pointy appearing between the locks of hair where his ears should be. A current in the water moved the hair further and he saw a small fin, long and thin, with three bony and sharp spines. The fin tissue was dark purple, nearly black. The fin opened, fully extended, and John realized the creature had not one but two of them, one on each side of his face. Were they ears, then? The fins trembled as they flared as wide as they could go, moving forward so they were parallel to John’s face. A behavior to seem more menacing?

The clicking sounds got louder, just before a high pitched wailing began. He saw the man open his mouth, aggressively showing a mouthful of sharp, white teeth. The man hissed when John’s respiratory system let off some bubbles, and pinned him harder against the rock. Something cracked behind his back, and John’s heartbeat increased, adrenaline and fear kicking in.

His oxygen tank. 

_ Well, fuck. _

He looked around, alarmed. The cave beneath the creature was pitch black, and he could not see any sign of movement. It might be only one creature?

John stilled, willing himself to go lax and as relaxed as possible. His head was pounding, yet his hands were as steady as he’d ever had them. He hoped that if the creature, if the  _ merman, _ thought John to be no menace he would let him go. Then John  might be able to swim back out of the cave and make it far enough to do a controlled emergency ascent. He could reach the boat and go back home… or call emergency services if needed… His phone was in the strongbox of his cabin…

_ Mermaids. You’re talking about bloody mermaids. Listen to yourself, Watson. Your tank is, if not broken, fissured at best. This is the lack of oxygen and the concussion talking. There’s no such thing as mermaids. _

But the merman in question looked like he had something different to say about it.

With his ear-fins still on display, his mouth slowly closed and his features softened a bit. Yet the pressure on John’s body was still as relentless as it had been from the start. The creature moved, getting closer to John’s own face, clicking and wailing, a bit muted this time. His eyes roamed all over him. Something soft touched John’s thighs and legs, a touch as light as a brush of hair or very thin fabric moved by the water. The touch seemed casual, as if it had been produced simply by the momentum of the creature. 

The man’s face was now dangerously close to his. John’s heart was beating fast, betraying his nervousness. The creature twisted his head slightly to one side and then the other, and John noticed the movement of two sets of three gills on the sides of his neck. They opened, showing a pink line of vulnerable flesh beneath before closing again. John risked looking the creature in the eye, hoping it wouldn’t consider him a menace.

The creature looked back, and he felt a bony hand with long thin fingers grab his arm over the neoprene. The clicking started again, but John could not see any kind of movement of his mouth. The only thing moving was his throat, as if he were swallowing something invisible. The ear-fins trembled once more and closed slowly, retreating back against the sides of his head, and a wave of dark hair covered them.

John gasped when a hand closed over his ear, sharp nails carefully exploring the shape of the cartilage. A bunch of bubbles flowed from the air filter, between their faces, and the hand at his ear stopped immediately. John stilled himself again, fearing the bubbles would make the creature answer back aggressively. The cloud of bubbles lifted and he saw the face of the man again, eyebrows raised, still looking at him. A part of John wanted to close his eyes because the nervousness of the unknown and the surreal situation were too much for him. But he found he was unable to avert his gaze. Not even to blink.

The creature opened his mouth and let some bubbles go. Then he stopped and let go of some more in intervals. John frowned. Was he trying to communicate?

The creature’s eyes narrowed, eyebrows nearly touching in an expression that looked very much like disappointment. 

John suddenly felt dizzy , and his vision failed him. It was starting to become hard to breathe. A moment later, to the amusement of the man floating in front of him, bubbles began to rapidly curl around him and rise from his back. His oxygen tank was definitely broken then. He was going to die down here. Having hallucinations about a mermaid.  _ Very _ vivid hallucinations. 

The creature pushed him away, his cloud of hair  gradually flowing till it covered his face for a second. John groaned and gasped, as the air became harder to pass through his lungs. There was water filling the tank. It was becoming heavier and heavier, slowly dragging him down to the bottom of the cave. He tried to free himself. Maybe his reserve tank would be enough to get him out of here.  _ Maybe... _

The clicking sounds came back, and he observed how the creature wailed quietly, looking very carefully at what he was doing. Too concerned with changing the tanks quickly enough not to faint from the lack of air, John couldn’t be arsed to care about it. The broken tank was getting heavier by the minute, and he felt the moment he touched down on the bottom of the cave. Worried about breaking the auxiliary tank, he tried to stay as still as he could.

With now trembling hands and feeling a sense of vertigo, his fingers slid over the valve without being able to change it. Growling, he tried again and again, but his arms felt heavy and he had no strength left. His eyes were beginning to close. It was so hard to breathe.

He saw a shadow blocking the light and suddenly felt the creature’s long fingers fumbling with the tubes connecting the valve to the broken tank and his mask. The high pitched wailing returned , the clicking sounds coming faster as if he were nervous. Something brushed his leg, passed over him, moving in rhythmic motions. He guessed it was a tail, moving behind them.

The main tank was full of water now. The steady flow of bubbles had finally stopped, and it felt as if John now had a bag of rocks on his back.

_ If this is how it ends... I can’t complain. I’m in a beautiful cave with an impossible creature. How many people can say that? I like this better than the Afghan dessert, anyway. _

Everything was getting darker, his eyelids were growing heavier with each passing minute. Hands were slowly touching him over the neoprene suit, grabbing the ties of the oxygen tank, messing with the breathing tubes. His hands dropped and he felt uncoordinated, as if he no longer had any control over his body. A sense of urgency crept up inside of him. The need to find air to breathe. Clean air. But it was useless. He no longer had the strength to do anything about it. He was most likely experiencing the effects of the concussion.

Perhaps he’d imagined all of it, after all? Perhaps there was no creature? 

Not that he cared. It was better this way. Dying alone inside a dark cave in the middle of nowhere was not among his top ten things to do. Any other presence, even if he’d made it up, was welcome.

He hoped Victor and Carol wouldn’t try to find him. He’d hate to get them killed too because he’d been  too stupid and careless. And Harry. Dear God. What if she fell off the wagon because of him? She’d been doing so well. The therapist helping her was so proud.  _ He _ was so proud of her.

_ Please. Please don’t let her drink again. Not because of me. _

He choked, water starting to invade his mouth. John made a weird noise, trying to cough without taking off his oxygen mask. He could distantly hear his own breathing becoming hard and difficult. He blinked once, still lightheaded, to see a pair of bright, grey eyes looking back at him. They reflected the torch light from the bottom of the cave, and John thought they seemed concerned.

He also thought they were the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.

And that was his last thought before he finally passed out, a thick veil of darkness washing over him like an unstoppable wave.

 

* * *

 

_ It isn’t moving. Is it dead? _

_ It might be. _

_ Oh. _

_ It’s doing unusual things now. Why? _

_ Ah. It’s hurt.  _

_ Dying?  _

_ Can’t say. _

_ Oh. This thing is like dolphins. I see. Needs air then. _

_ Fuck. _

_ It’s dying.  _

_ Fuckfuckfuck not dying.  _

_ Don’t.  _

_ Die.  _

_ You.  _

_ Stupid.  _

_ Thing.  _

_ Ugh it’s heavy. _

_ Pregnant? _

_ Female? _

_ It looks like female. No male appendages _ . 

Sherlock moved swiftly, his strong tail floating beneath him. He placed his arms around the creature where he guessed it’s middle was. Careful to make sure there were no claws or other harmful parts, he secured the heavy, limp figure against his torso, mindful of his own spines. He was surprised about the thing’s shortage of fins. What kind of fish had so few fins? How did it navigate or swim adequately? Was it crippled? 

_ Well, maybe it is defective. Maybe that was why it wandered into my nest. And why it is dying now.  _

Maybe after it died he’d be able to inspect it. He could try to get some answers. He’d never seen one like this before. And if it didn’t die, he could always keep it and observe it. It did not look like something dangerous. It had been pretty easy to render it vulnerable. 

_ It couldn’t even speak. What was that bubble thing again? Maybe it was dying already? _

Leaving the strange light behind them, The merman kept hold of the dying thing and swam fast and steady, heading back to  the pitch dark tunnels where it came from. 

It was hard for him to swim with the extra weight of another, especially one as heavy as this one. t was difficult  to do while trying not to hit the thing with either his own body or the cave around them. The tunnels were usually big enough to let him swim comfortably but safely away from possible predators or intruders. His tail however, when all its fins were displayed, could scarcely manoeuvre. His dorsal fins’ spines sometimes scratched the top rock, and on a few occasions had he broken a tip while doing so. It wasn’t painful but it wasn’t exactly pleasant either.  Unfortunately, the tunnels weren’t quite large enough for a merman like him  _ and _ a… thing to swim easily at the same time.

The creature started to convulse against his body halfway there and, fearing it would die before they made it to open waters, he swam faster.  With one hand he held the part he thought was most likely the head, cradling it carefully against his chest so it did not die from the force of water. Something sharp was poking his skin, but it was a necessary evil. Better a small scratch than a dead… thing.

He groaned, bothered by the stupidity of nature’s flaws. Why create something that died so easily? Why send it to him?

_ I want to know what you are. If you die, you’re no fun at all. Don’t die, you stupid thing _ , he thought, holding the body tightly. 

A faint blue light received him and he wailed in triumph. With a couple more thrusts of his tail he reached the surface of the water, jumping out for a second, splashing everywhere.

_ Ok, thing. I’m leaving you here. This is good air. Breathe. _

He took the creature to a nearby rock smooth enough to lay the thing down without damaging it. He released the body hoping, expecting it to move, but it wasn’t doing anything at all.

Anything except sinking, that was.

_ C’mon! Thing! Breathe! This is good air for you! _

But the thing wasn’t breathing. At all.

It was just laying there, slipping off the rock if he didn’t hold it. He growled, flicking his tail in disgust. 

Grabbing the body again, he moved it to another location. He had to inspect it, to see if he could make it breathe. Growling again, he threw the limp body against a sandy path above the rock where the water was low enough to keep the creature from submerging. He carefully flexed his tail underneath the water to hold himself over the creature, his body rising from the water.

Looming over the dying body, he realised something. Even if it looked strange, it had some similarities to his own physique. The upper part of the torso looked like his own body, just with different skin and a different colour. And of course, there were those weird appendages coming from where a mouth should be. The thing had been trying to reach for them. Maybe that was what was stopping it from breathing.

_ I’ll try to remove it. Maybe this dumb thing tried to eat the strange floating stuff that comes from above the waters. Turtles do it sometimes. And dolphins. Maybe he was cast out the clutch and was never taught to avoid that? _

_ Could this thing be a deformed…? I’ve never seen one of us look like this. _

He carefully reached for the black, circular protuberance coming from were the thing’s mouth should be… if it was some sort of deformed being, that was. When he touched it, he retreated, expecting it to open its eyes and bite. But nothing happened. The thing was as limp as could be.

Determined to do whatever he could, he grabbed the body part and tried moving it around. It moved and had a similar feel to the floating stuff.

_ You dumb thing, you ate one of those. I should let you die for being idiotic. _

He pulled.

Water rushed upwards through the black tube-thing , and then stopped. He flinched when the water splashed in his own face, shaking his head and hissing. 

_ Stupid thing. Stupid dead thing. _

He threw the black device away, hearing it splash into the water nearby, and looked closely at the creature again.

It  _ did _ look like him. A bit. But it also looked a bit… pretty.

There was something scratchy and barb-like around the mouth, . Because yes, it did look like a mouth, but the teeth were all wrong. They weren’t sharp, but round edged instead. And the lips were currently turning an alarming shade of blue.

_ Even if it bites me, it can’t do much harm. How has it fed itself for so long? Is it young? It’s so small. And it has two small tails… Looks… painful… _

He thought of the pain of his tail being cut in two and he wanted to scream. He wailed instead. Then he grabbed the body by the shoulders and shook it hard in a desperate attempt to wake the thing up. The black, dark body was slippery and soft and there were no scales no be seen.

_ Why won’t you just BREATHE! _

The thing remained limp. He lowered it back down to the sand.

_ Maybe there’s more floating stuff stuck down his throat. I could take it out. I’m checking. _

He opened the creature’s mouth and tried to look inside. There was nothing to be seen except the inside of a regular mouth. He hissed in frustration.

I _ f you bite me, I’m killing you with my own hands, you stupid crippled thing. _

He put his own mouth against the thing’s… and blew.

The thing’s middle rose and fell. Well. That was an improvement. 

_ So It  _ can _ breathe. Maybe this will help? I’ll show you how to breathe again, you dumbarse.  _

He tried it again. And again. And a few more times.

And...

Water everywhere. Warm, smelly water hit him in the face. Again.

He hissed and jumped back, shaking his head and rubbing his face with his hands.

_ Disgusting! _

He jumped back inside the water and swam in circles in the small lagoon, desperately trying to clean his face and mouth while hissing and baring his teeth. 

Oh,  the water was so smelly and tasted awful and wrong and how dare that dying thing throw that in his face…  _ Wait. _

He swam back to where he had left the creature and ventured a  peek out of the water.

The thing was breathing! Screeching in triumph, he splashed his tail in the water.

_ At last! _

Carefully, he slid the body back into the water, making sure to keep everything except the head immersed. The ocean was warm enough to keep it alive, not like the water outside of his cave, and it would keep it moisturised. And good air could flow safely. 

The creature looked like it was sleeping.

_ Food. It will need to eat. I’ll go hunting.  _

_ Try not to die, Crippled. I’ll be back before you notice, _ he clicked to the thing. Not that he had any hope of it answering in a way he could understand. 

_ Don’t mess up my nest. _

He  headed back for the tunnels he had swam with Crippled. He grabbed the floating, dark thing, with its black tubes floating behind it. 

_ And I’m taking this with me. Or you might try to eat it again, dumb thing. _  
  



	2. Crippled

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to Eragon19, who has been my beta for this chapter! 
> 
> I hope you enjoy!

“Bloody hell.”

John groaned, feeling an intense pulse of pain at the back of his head. The memory of hitting a rock with it came to his mind, and he groaned again. His ribs hurt too, only slightly, as if he had been wearing something very tight for a long time. Taking deep breaths was simply bothersome, and his eyes burned.

He guessed he had a fever.

_If this is death, I’ve been cheated._ _What good is being dead if it hurts so bloody much._

He opened his eyes. 

“I’m dead after all, aren’t I?” he muttered, with a shade of wonder at his voice.

 All he could say was that he was lying on  his back, and facing the most surreal sky he had ever seen. There was a soft blue light coming from what looked like small stars and teardrops of light, and he could see the reflection of the light all around him.

Groaning, he dared to move. If he wasn’t dead, that meant that somehow he had managed to reach a safe place before blacking out. Which made no sense, because he clearly remembered being underwater and then just… nothing.

John was not sure what to believe in what he remembered. Because he also remembered a  _ merman _ . And there were no such thing as mer...folk. 

He was halfway in the water, and he was surprised to discover he wasn’t cold at all. Wherever it was that he ended up drifting at, it was certainly warmer than the inside of the cave. The neoprene was still on, which was  very good, but his mask and oxygen tubes were gone. John carefully examined the regulator, only to find out the place where the tubes were meant to connect was broken. Maybe he got caught on some rock and it got torn.

Taking off the gloves and dropping them into the water by his side, John struggled to detach the oxygen tanks. Not that they would be much help now, one being broken and the other full but with no way to use it. 

Slowly, he managed to free himself from both tanks, and groaned. John moved and sat down at the sand, water rising to the middle of his chest when he rose. He winced and gasped when his vision turned suddenly black, numbness washing over him for a minute. He felt like floating, before  coming back to his body, white sparks like snow filling his eyes until they slowly disappeared. 

Then the sharp pain came back full force.

Right. Concussion. He was lucky to be alive, at this point. 

A splash sounded somewhere inside the cave, and he moved out of the water as fast as he could without getting dizzy. He crawled backwards, finding humid, slippery rocks  jutting out of the white sand. He heard another splash, this time closer, and turned to look around. If there was something big enough to make a sound that loud, he was in trouble.  It surely wouldn’t be a dolphin.

A clear picture of something impossible answered to John, surging from his recent memory. He dismissed it. It was just the concussion talking. 

_ Either that, or I’m definitely going nuts.  _

Fog covered his vision and he groaned, tearing his goggles off and  feeling the chill air hit his eyes for the first time. He blinked a few times, and both his breathing and his heart stopped.

There, under the clear water was the most impossible,  most incredible thing.

“I must be high as a kite. On… on something. Maybe the oxygen tank was contaminated?”

_ Yeah. Sure. The tank was contaminated with hallucinogenic drugs, John. Good job, buddy. _

Slowly, a head surfaced from the water Drops of water fell  from raven-dark hair and blue eyes looked at him, a  _ bloody second eyelid  _ moving over them, very much like he had seen crocodile’s do at the zoo when he was a kid. 

It was… a man. Or at least it looked like a young man, with high cheekbones and full lips. Long eyelashes and baby blue eyes and a long, thin pale neck… with scars? 

He frowned, looking at the reddish marks at both sides of the man’s neck. They were thick, curved lines, somewhere between pink and red, and looked a bit swollen from where John was standing.  Had this… men… creature… confronted something capable of leaving such scars?

As if per magic, the lines at the man’s neck fluttered before moving. John was shocked to see how pieces of skin slowly moved upwards, flexing before closing again. 

_ They’re gills. Oh my God. Where am I? _

John felt as if he had been trapped inside a children’s fantasy book.  He wondered if that was how Alice felt like after falling down the rabbit hole, the first time she laid her eyes on Wonderland.

But maybe Alice hadn’t felt like she was super high on weed and other drugs, and especially not like she might faint at any moment. Mainly because Alice was a made up little girl and she could not get high. Or suffer a concussion. 

He saw something shine behind the man’s head under the water. The most incredible thing. 

A big tail, much like the mermaids John had seen in kids fairytale books, was beside him floating languidly. He could not see were it started and he could only approximate the total length, drifting below the water as it was. But it looked huge. It was dark, somewhere between black, deep blue and purple when the light hit. Similar to the coloration of black pearls; teal with purple overtones.  It had what looked like a forked caudal fin, and what looked like caudal keels. A fast swimmer, then. John could also see what looked like purple pectoral and pelvic fins floating under the water, so he assumed the tail of the creature would be starting at the hips… 

He sneezed.

The creature hissed and jumped back. John saw a file of sharp fishbones unfold fast as lightning from his back. They could be seen behind the man’s head like a sort of crown of thorns.

John also saw how sharp, white teeth flashed at the man’s mouth. It was more shocking than anything else, really. Maybe because it was an absolutely alien thing to find on an else perfectly human face. Also because sharp teeth meant that, whatever it was, it ate living things. Raw. 

It could very well eat him.

Was John going to be a meal?

The creature remained still for a moment. Aside from the ritmic sound of  water falling into the lagoon and the steady flow of several small streams, the cave was absolutely silent. John could actually hear his own heartbeat.

After what seemed like an eternity, the creature clicked. It was a sound that could pass easily for a human tongue clicking, if he had moved his face at all. The sound was high pitched, and came, apparently, from the creature’s throat instead of mouth. John could see the movement of his Adam’s apple, and it was so fascinating, he failed to notice that the mermaid… merman, was moving forward. Moving forward  _ to reach him.  _

John gasped and crawled backwards, trying not to let the wet white hand that came out to catch him. When he noticed John’s movement, the merman moved faster.  He reached forward and grabbed John’s ankle, just over his flipper. The hand slipped before clutching him harder, and John made a sound he was not very proud of. Fear clenched in his gut and twisted them and all he could think about was fleeing. 

The merman crawled out of the water to get him, and in his desperate attempt to get free of the hand, he failed to grab a rock behind him. John crashed into it full force. He hissed and cursed as he felt the rock cut through his neoprene and into the flesh beneath. 

Everything stilled for a moment and he took a foolish second to check on his hand and forearm. It was a crimson mess, blood diluting in the water that covered him and sliding down his body onto the rocks beneath. Under the softblue light, it looked a dark shade of purple, almost black. The damage was more to  his forearm than his hand, which had only a scratch. Even then, it only looked like a minor injury. Trust water to make any injury look like you are bleeding out.

The hand on his ankle stilled and softly let go. With no time to think, John curled up, protecting his feet in case the merman would strike again, but nothing came for him. For a moment, he thought about taking the flippers off. But being unsure about what his options were, getting rid of his gear was not an option. Who knows if he would need it later.

When he dared to look behind him John saw the merman’s torso out of the water and over the wet sand. Just were the rocks ended and water started, the creature was holding itself up with his arms and had his head softly tilted to a side, as if trying to understand.

The muscles on  what looked like a perfect human torso were an amazing display. They were tense, showing their  definition. The arms were those of a swimmer, and the pectorals were strong and well cut . There were nipples, so either it was a reminiscence of some kind, or these creatures were mammals somehow. The abs were defined, and marked a path down to the man’s hips. John could see the hip bones, going down to what was supposed to be a groin… but were the pubic hair should start, scales began to grow. At first, the skin looked like a shark’s. Strong and rough, dark colored. But at some point, small, shiny scales appeared. They were dispersed at first, and then grew bigger and closer, until they formed a safe, perfect doublet like pattern. John was sure they were as sharp and hard as anything he had touched before. 

“Who are you? Do you even have a name?”

He felt suddenly stupid talking to the creature. Was he going to get even crazier if he just spoke to his hallucinations? Or was it inevitable? The creature’s ear-fins twitched at the sound of his voice as if he was listening.

Clicking sounds came out of the creature’s mouth, as he moved his lips. It was high pitched, very similar to what he had heard underwater before. Maybe… maybe he was not hallucinating after all. 

John frowned. 

“John,'' he said, pointing at his own chest. “Watson. John Watson”, he repeated, making sure to say it slowly.

The merman’s ears (John decided it was just easier to think about them as ears, at this point), twitched and vibrated, moving in the direction of the sound of his voice. It seemed like  behaviour more appropriate for a cat, and with great effort he resisted the urge to move forward and  _ touch them.  _

“My name. Is. John Watson.”

The creature’s tail splashed once behind him. The impressive fin pressing up the water as if it were jelly, before breaking the surface barrier and making the drops fly across the air. The forked caudal fin came out, high in the air. To the dim blue light, it looked beautiful. It was translucid, and looked extremely delicate. As if anything could break it or tear it apart. 

John flinched, drops getting to his face and soaking his legs. That was… that was a strong tail he had to say. He took a mental note not to get in its way  _ ever _ . The memory of strong muscle pressing against him, the pain in his ribs when he had been held against the cave’s wall…

“Ooon.”

John blinked in surprise, and stilled. 

“Oon waaaon.”

The voice was deep. Deep as anything John had ever heard before. It was like the purr of a panther, and something inside him twisted and pulled, low on his gut. 

The creature’s ears kept moving, twitching, as it kept producing sounds.

“Waaaaaaaaooooon.”

“Yeah”, John said, fascinated with the merman’s efforts to learn how to produce those new sounds. Perhaps he had never learned how to speak? In any human language?

The tail splashed again, twice. The creature seemed… content. 

“That’s right. More or less. What’s your name?” John asked, signaling him. The creature showed his teeth and took a step back, looking straight to the pointed finger in his direction. 

John stilled. Then, slowly, he opened his hands, palms to the mermaid. The creature stilled, teeth still bared. John put his hands against his chest and said his name, before moving them in the creature’s direction. This would be easier, he thought, if he could just get closer to the creature.  He was not going to get any step closer than he was now. Not unless he knew he wouldn’t be murdered or eaten for dinner. 

The creature opened his mouth and produced a sound low like a song. It was short, with a final sort of click. It was… musical. And beautiful.

And John had no idea what it meant or how to pronounce it. 

Or if it was the creature’s name at all. 

“Seloc?”

The creature looked annoyed, and John quickly learned the difference between a happy splash and a negative splash. The annoyed splash was fast as light, hard against the water surface. It sounded more like a slap than something breaking into the water. John did not like that. 

“Er… Zelok?”

The creature splashed again and to John’s eternal surprise he huffed. It tried again to teach John how to pronounce, but he was sure some of the sounds were not even meant to be made by any human voice. Because he could not remember anything capable of making them, either. 

Finally, the creature seemed satisfied with the results at his last try. Or at least, looked like he appreciated the effort John was doing. The merman moved, going underwater for a bit. He fussed with something,  peeked out of the water again, squinted at him, and then submerged himself again. His whole body seemed to wiggle under the still, clear water, tail splashing softly from time to time. John was amazed by how much this creature resembled a cat in its behaviour.  Then by how much he was starting to not be afraid of it. 

The merman surfaced again and looked at John as he threw something at his feet. It was a Bass, big as John had never seen one before. It splashed on the rocks at John’s feet, mouth opening and closing, trying to get some water to breath. Then, another one landed next to the first, just as big. And then, to his surprise, a string of mussels, and a couple of oysters.

John looked at the food at his feet, unable to say a thing, and then looked to the merman, clueless as to what to do with it all. The creature was looking at him, without blinking. Waiting.

He suddenly felt like some sort of gratitude was the appropriate way to proceed. He cleared his throat and moved to sit properly. He took an oyster and rose it in direction to the waiting merman, as in a toast.

“Thank you.”

The creature splashed his tail (a happy splash), his ears twitching. But he kept staring, as in waiting for something to happen. Confused, John moved to sit as comfortable as he could on the rock where he was sheltered at. After a while, the merman huffed, exasperated, and submerged again for a moment before surfacing again. John saw as the merman pushed himself out, to sit on a rock. John was captivated again by how strong he must be, to rise a body and a tail that heavy with such apparent ease.

He saw that  the merman had another Bass. Strong, big hands with long fingers held the twitching fish. The creature gave John a long look , as if making sure he was watching before snapping the fish's head. It was quick and efficient, and now the fish laid lax. Then, the creature bit down, and took a large bite of the fish.

John had a sudden feeling of nausea. Surely it wasn’t expecting him to eat the thing raw… wasn’t it? John looked at the oyster at his hand, and swallowed. Well. If he managed to open it with something, he could try to eat it. Better a raw oyster or mussel than raw fish… and the last thing he wanted was to offend the beast…

John started to look around for a rock or something he could use to open it. When he could not see anything at hand, he tried to push it open with his own hands. He knew he wouldn't make it, but it was worth a try he supposed. After a few tries, with no results, he remembered. He had a knife on him. God bless for wary divers and army training. He patted his legs, in search of the pocket where he had his knife. With a sound of triumph, he took it out. When he looked up, he saw the merman had put the half eaten fish on the rock, and was looking at him with a hand extended his way, as if waiting for him to give him the oyster. Blood was dripping down his wet chin and chest. John tried not to think about it like some sort of premonition of what was to come if he even dared to get any closer to the mermaid.

The mermaid turned his head slightly to the side, as if trying to understand. His ears twitched again, and he slowly pulled back his hand. Maybe he was curious about what John was going to do with the knife. Good. Curious meant he was not a menace. 

John proceeded to open the knife. His hands were slippery, so he had great care not to cut himself with the sharp blade. Once it was open, and feeling the heavy eyes of the merman over him, he slipped the tip of the knife at the oyster’s crack, softly sliding it inside. With the hand holding the shell, he turned it around the blade, making sure nothing was obstructing the sides of the shell and the opening. Then, carefully, he turned the knife so it acted as a lever.

The oyster opened, and he chuckled.  _ Well, that went rather smoothly, didn't it? _

He took the knife out and closed it again, putting it back inside his leg pocket. He took the oyster between his hands and, feeling observed, looked up. The merman had forgotten entirely about his meal, and was looking at him as if he held the secrets of the universe. The tail behind him splashed again, lazily.

John opened the oyster.

The merman's eyebrows rose.

The ex army doctor smiled, and rose the oyster shell to his face. Then, he proceeded to swallow it without thinking very much about it. It wasn't the most pleasant sensation he had experimented, but it was definitely better than having to bite and chew raw fish.

He ate the first one, discarded it putting it on his side, and then proceeded to open the other one, and did not bother to even close the knife this time. He would not admit that he  _ was  _ hungry. True, he had not noticed it until he had put something in his stomach, but still. Once he finished with the couple of oysters, he proceeded to open some of the mussels. Fish were still gasping for air, but stopped twitching. John thought it was cruel to let them suffer , so he efficiently killed them with the knife before resuming his work on the shellfish.

John was barely aware that he was making some inappropriate sounds while eating, and that he was probably being a bit messy about it. In his defense, it was a good dam shellfish. His beard was probably a mess, but who cared. He had bigger problems. Like not cutting himself with the shells while opening them, or discarding safely from the already eaten mussels, so he wouldn't step on them and cut himself later. He decided to keep the oyster shells. Maybe they could be useful in the future. Perhaps as a kind of improvised glass to drink. If he even got any fresh water. 

That was a problem for the future John. Present John was more worried about having something to eat, and not becoming the next meal for the beast looking at him from the water.

He was sure the merman could easily get to him if he wished to. He was strong enough, and John hadn't made it very far on the rocks.  For now, they seemed to have achieved a sort of truce, and that was fine by him.

Once he had eaten half of the mussels, the mermaid made a sound and turned, to finish his fish. Perhaps he had finally considered John intelligent enough to feed himself? Or got hungry and just couldn't care anymore if John was feeding or scratching his butt.

Knowing he was no longer  entertainment, or anything interesting, he decided to move slowly towards a pool of water he saw between rocks, to clean the knife, his hands, and his face as best as he could. Then he’d worry about finding a way to get some fresh water to drink. The salt at his lips was making him thirsty, and he had no idea how long he could manage without a drink.

The first chance he got, he needed to find a way out of the cave and get to his boat. There were some bottles of water and packed food in his small cooler. His phone and documents were inside a waterproof bag in his safe. He had fuel enough to get back to the coast. That was all he needed.

A hard splash reminded him it wouldn't be easy.

He cleaned the knife efficiently and put it back at his leg pocket. This time for good. He splashed some water over his face, and cleaned his hands. His beard was clean, which was a relief. He would hate to smell like fish all the time.

He went back quietly to his previous spot at the rock, and leaned against one at his back. It wasn't perfect, but it was enough to get some rest for his back.

When John looked up again, the merman was getting back inside of the water, clinking some more in his direction. John was sure it was trying to communicate, that it was becoming a real pain in the arse not to be able to understand what was being said to him. Either the merman was a sentient creature, or John was going absolutely nuts.

He liked to think it was the first one. For completely and understandably biased reasons. There was a  _ very _ loud splash, and some drops got to his face.

“Ooouunwaaaooon.”

The merman got quiet, as if waiting for some sort of reply, amd John felt stupid.

“Er… cool. Do your... thing. I’ll be just here… trying not to die”, he replied, feeling even more stupid than before.

As if satisfied with the answer, the merman disappeared down the clear water again with a splash. And John was alone again.

**Author's Note:**

> On a side-note, if yall haven't seen Good Omens... What the heck are you waiting for? Go! xd
> 
> (I hope you liked this mermaid thing, because I can't stop now. Seriously xd )


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